"Are we prepared to promote conditions in which the living contact with God can be reestablished? For our lives today have become godless to the point of complete vacuity. God is no longer with us in the conscious sense of the word. He is denied, ignored, excluded from every claim to have a part in our daily life." - Alfred Delp, S.J.

Thursday, August 25, 2011

Thinking about the Holy Father and the Extraordinary Form of Mass...

I'm no expert to be sure, but it seems to me that the Holy Father is just fine with the Ordinary Form of Mass. It is my understanding that he celebrates the so called Novus Ordo every day. We know he celebrates all of his public Masses using the Ordinary Form with great reverence and solemnity. Obviously the Holy Father loves the Mass, which explains in part why he issued the Summorum Pontificum. Nevertheless, I think it noteworthy that the Holy Father always celebrates Mass according to the Ordinary Form - the Novus Ordo of Paul VI.
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I don't think it is ever a good idea for anyone to try and think for the Pope, or to put words into his mouth, or to interpret what he is really saying and doing to suit one's agenda.

34 comments:

Terry, serious comment here from me. Do you mean we are not obliged to go back to the old ways? I thought or imagined I was gleaming that the Pope prefers everything traditional and I don't understand it all, so was trying to get nice trads to explain it. There are a couple of really sweet ones on blogger. To listen to some catholics we have to go back to the old rite in order to save the faith. (I'm not exaggerating, they do say that)I wonder if some are still under Rome's rule in their own heads.

I am a child of the Novus Ordo, I know no other, it's my Mass and where my heart it. There are those in this church who believe that The EF is the answer to all that is wrong with this church, I disagree, we can't go backwards.

I have never understood why the fuss of one over the other. Why can't you have both? I actually love both. I don't want the Old Mass every Sunday, but I love the thought that this Mass may be offered for God somewhere in the world every day. I believe it must stay for that very reason. However, the Novus Order is wonderful for Man in our full participation to God. Both are good.

It's sort of like roses and daisies. They are both beautiful flowers in their own way, both serving a purpose. You couldn't say one is better than the other. They are both God 's gift to us. And so are the two Masses.

Off topic....Due to the damage suffered by the Washington National Cathedral in Tuesday's quake, Saturday's interfaith service for 3,000 to mark the opening of the MLKing memorial is now set for the Basilica National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception.Big smile.

That's the whole point. It always boils down to the, shall I say, whims of the pope du jour. This pope obviously now more broadly tolerates the EF but has not once to my knowledge even attended one much less celebrated one after Summorum Pontificium and he has had multiple opportunities to do so in St. Peter's. Instead he has polished up the OF in his personal celebrations in contrast to the whims of JPII. The EF has now been relegated to the more exotic liturgies, such as the Ethiopian, which certainly do take place in Rome in their quaint settings but hardly touch the masses of those brought up in the OF. Pope Benedict XVI is as much now a product of the OF and VCII as those masses.

The deciding issue concerning the position of the priest at the altar is, as we have said, the nature of the Mass as a sacrificial offering.

The person who is doing the offering is facing the one who is receiving the offering; thus, he stands before the altar, positioned ad Dominum, facing the Lord.

If, nowadays, the aim is to emphasize the aspect of the communal meal during the "Eucharistic Feast" by celebrating versus populum, this aim is not being met, at least not in the way some might have hoped.

The new arrangement has the "meal leader" positioned at the table, by himself.

The other "meal participants" are situated in the nave, or in the "auditorium," not directly connected to the "meal table." ...

The focus must forever be on God, not man.

This has always meant that everyone turn towards Him in prayer, rather than that the priest face the people. From this insight, we must draw the necessary conclusion and admit that the celebration versus populum is, in fact, an error.

In the final analysis, celebration versus populum is a turning towards man, and away from God.

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When the Holy father stated "The Smoke of Satan has entered the Church" what do you all think it meant?

Is everything suddenly 'Okay' now?

The Tridentine Mass is Calvary; when you attend it, you are at Calvary.

Due to a scheduling conflict, I had to attend the OF today and oh how times have changed! I noticed at communion time, some genuflected, some bowed, a few knelt. My, oh, my...12-15 years ago that sort of behavior would have warranted a little talking to after Mass.

Some interesting statistics I heard yesterday from France...

1 in 5 priests are ordained in the EF.

Average Sunday Mass attendance at the Cathedral of Bordeaux: 70

Average Sun Mass Attendance at the SSPX chapel in the same diocese: over 700.

The govt is working with the SSPX to hand over many of the churches there since they are barely used.

I understand the situation is the same in Germany and spreading.

Those with an invested interest in Vatican II will be dead in 20 years, including Benedict XVI, who, after the Council, refereed to the traditional Mass as nothing but a Baroque opera.

The Holy Father ordered a complete overhaul of the liturgy last year--who knows when we'll see that.

The Church will be completely different in 20 years time, all we have to do is pray and trust.

Clark, the SSPX are not the future. How does splitting oneself from the Church help anyone? And SSPX groups and chapels are just as prone to heresy and sin as anyone else - I have heard of SSPX priests saying all sorts of crazy stuff that is not what the church teaches, but is based on private and individual interpretation of tradition. Also, if a group defines itself necessarily by it's opposition to any and all changes in liturgy, approach, thinking, devotion, etc (not doctrine or morality - those are eternal), and if they are bound into a position that they must reject everything ehh comes from Rome unless it matches their interpretation of tradition, then how is this anything like how the Curch is supposed to be?

Do we demand that everything be exactly as it was in 1940? Actually, it's worse - the SSPX types typically want a Church that never has existed since the beginning, with a rigoristically rigorous rigorism demanded of everyone.

I am so sick of people thinking that they are literally more Catholic than the pope. Have they ever head of hubris?

And the SSPX in Germany spend their time sneaking unapproved pamphlets into the back of churches telling people it's a mortal sin to receive communion in the hand and that it's a mortal sin for women to wear pants. I know this because my priest friend there had to clear the stuff put all the time - and he was no liberal (he talked about the frightening time in the 60s when everyone was jettisoning tradition and few remained faithful).

Mercury, I was using them as an example. They are not in heresy, nor in schism and never have been. They are canonically irregular and I didn't fully understand why they had to play hardball with Rome until recently. At any rate, I only use the SSPX as one example, there are many other traditional groups, even the Missionaries of Charity are beginning to use the EF as their Mass of choice--and why wouldn't they? Let's see a form of Mass codified by a saint or a form of liturgy designed by Modernist heretics and Protestants? Tough choice.

Clark, I didn't say they were heretics, just that heresy is found within their ranks, and that they are not above reproach in that regard. They also deliberately eschew anything written by popes, catechists, and spiritual writers since the Council, insisting that there can and must not be any development in any way whatsoever. They are the same kid of people who called Aquinas a heretic and Sanchez and Liguori laxists.

And if they are not in formal schism, that is merely a technicality. The way they set themselves over and above the Church, the way they attack the pope and the bishops is nothing short of scandalous. I would certainly say that many SSPX supporters do in fact cultivate a spirit of schism.

To me, if John Paul II celebrated the "Novus Ordo", and Benedict XVI does, I see no reason to believe it will endanger my faith.

Ha, I remember reading an article about the SSPX in the Ukraine attacking the Byzantine rite and insisting on the Tridentine as the only valid Mass. You know, the rite that u centuries OLDER than the Tridentine?

But since we're interpreting the Holy Father's mind by his actions... It is my understanding the he regularly celebrates the traditional Mass in private... And I always thought his dolled up Novus Ordo Masses were just gettin you all ready for the real thing. Hah.

"Those with an invested interest in Vatican II will be dead in 20 years"

Jesus, you mean? His investment is incalculable but He can't die, again.

I take it you are very young and have been listening to Fr Z and his cohorts too keenly, which is why you can wish a whole generation of Catholics dead without even uttering a request for mercy upon their souls, yet I expect you would defend the unborn human in your next breath?

Unbelievable, truly incomprehensible.

If that's traditionalism, yuk! Stick that attitude where the sun don't shine. Hell.

You seem to be confused about the Novus Ordo and celebration ad orientem, as if they are mutually exclusive. They are not, and in fact the rubrics assume ad orientem. Neither is there anything mandated about hippy music, heretical preaching, or liturgical innovation.

I have been blessed to attend mainly parishes where the Ordinary Form is celebrated reverently, including one parish that celebrates it in Latin, ad orientem, with beautiful renaissance music and plainchant.

I have also attended some terrible masses where I had to wonder if they were actually valid since the priest ad libbed during the consecration. I find that the worst of these tend to be presided by older priests -- you know, the ones that were raised on the old Mass. Most younger priests I have known, who have no memory of pre-Vat-II, are orthodox in their preaching and reverent in their liturgy.

Heather - Just this morning we had a substitute priest who celebrates Mass according to his own rubrics - I think it was valid. But you are absolutely correct, there are parishes where the Novus Ordo is celebrated according to the rubrics, sometimes even in latin and ad orientum - very reverently and solemnly.

Puff - in the early '70's I came back to the sacraments and while speaking to the young assistant priest, he complained that his pastor, an old monsignor, would not turn the altar around and say Mass facing the people, he said at the time, "Gratefully he will be retiring" and "his generation won't be around for much longer."

I came back to the sacraments when the Mass was the Novus Ordo yet was celebrated in Latin and ad orientem at a couple of churches in town - it was before the novelties caught on. Even after the pastor retired and the altar turned around and the Mass was completely in English, that church never really changed - the high altar and redos remained. I didn't mind Mass facing the people since I could focus upon what was happening more closely. I didn't mind the vernacular because I could hear the prayer of the priest.

I also never questioned communion in the hand since I was told it was approved - instead I thrilled to be able to touch our Lord who had been placed in my hand by his priest. Today I prefer to receive kneeling and on the tongue - but will follow the custom of the parish.

Thank you for noticing that the Holy Father is trying to lead by example. I am sick of these OF/EF wars -- either form should be celebrated with all due dignity and reverence for Almighty God. If our eyes are on God, we won't notice what the next fellow is doing or know or care. Each of us should be offering our whole selves during the Mass, uniting our offering to Christ's all-sufficient one, instead of looking around to see who is doing what how.

Veritatis Splendor

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